the internet equivalent to blueberry waffles cover in bacon………….. mmmmmmm……..bacon

I had heard it was possible but never truly believed it could happen to me.

No, not erectile dysfunction.

Writers block.

A total lack of not just the ability to write but the lack of desire to even look at the keyboard.

I spent so much time in the preparation of my book that I actually burnt myself out on the words I had written.

Much like anyone that has ever been on a hardcore diet and then realized they like pizza more than they kale, I let myself get out of the routine of writing.

I watched as the stats exploded for no reason on my fiction blog and spent days trying to figure out why.

I got sidetracked by the first bad review my book got. The words stung like the worst case of razor burn you’ve ever had on your genitals.

So I went back to the beginning. Putting pen to paper. Writing notes and details for stories that had been rolling around in my head for far too long. Stuff that will most likely end up on my fiction blog but writing begets more writing.

Hopefully, you all stick around while I find my path back to getting my junk frozen to stuff.

Judging by the Max Headroom head shot and the Gunstar from The Last Starfighter being clearly visible in this picture, I would have to say that this genius level math equation was solved sometime in the late eighties.

Makes that shit Matt Damon solved on the chalk board in Good Will Hunting look like my dogs figuring out that if they pee on there feet in the winter time it will freeze them to the deck.

If you have been following my blog for any length of time you might know that I have a book coming out.

I may have told you about it once or seventeen times.

I have made some copies available to reviewers and so far the response has been overwhelming. I feel like Sally Field at the Oscars screaming “You like me…..you really like me….”. I have been trying to figure out other ways to get this glorious tome of personal debasement into as many hands as possible but it’s not as easy as you might think.

So I took the plunge and decided that all those non ebook loving people out there should also have the chance to get their hands on my junk the same as everyone else.

So in a box perched uncomfortable close to a Guinea pig cage right now are the very first print copies of Cougars, Cookies and Construction. If you look for it on Goodreads there is a give away deal to be the first of my fabulous followers to get their very own copy.

In the very near future (as in as soon as the unreal nature of actually holding the book in my hands becomes not so surreal and I proof the thing all over again for errors), it will be available for order.

On December 8th, the ebook is available on Amazon so get your copy here –

Up here in the Great White North, our Thanksgiving was weeks ago but we are still inundated with American culture. By the time you’ve eaten turkey, lied to your family about how things are going in your life, and watched Planes, Trains and Automobiles, it’s Black Friday. Some choose to spend the day at home with their family, while others, more appropriately, rush out to save money on products that they’ll spend way more time with than

No one knows the origin of the term “Black Friday.” Historians say that it dates back to the age of the dinosaurs when a meteor darkened the sky on a Friday while the dinosaurs were shopping. Real historians say that the term has a definite origin, and that I made the whole dinosaur thing up but these are also the people who say there actually was a moon landing and the Loch Ness Monster isn’t real.

According to websites that show up on the first page of Google because let’s be honest, no one ever looks any further than that, since the day after Thanksgiving has long been crowded with shoppers and traffic jams, the Philadelphia police began referring to the troublesome day as Black Friday, and it soon caught on. Word has it that the Philadelphia police also came up with Movember, March Madness and Ruby Tuesday. It appears they are very good at branding.

Before you bring up this historical anecdote every Thanksgiving in an effort to sound intelligent in front of your younger brother’s new girlfriend that has been sneaking a hand up your leg at the table during dinner , know that the online historians at Wikipedia also link the term to age-old accounting practices. Apparently, accounting firms used to commonly use red ink to indicate negative amounts and black ink to indicate positive amounts (that’s the system that I use when recording my weight). Because many of these businesses depended on the day after Thanksgiving to compensate for losses in previous quarters, the black ink came to represent the massive profits seen on that day . At least that’s what retired accountants tell their disinterested grandchildren.

For years now, stores have been trying to extend this period of crazed shopping by opening earlier and earlier after Thanksgiving. First they went to 6 a.m., then 4 a.m., then 12 a.m., until stores began opening the night before and causing family members to take their turkey to-go while they shopped for televisions or dildos or whatever it is that people buy.

As is traditional, every Black Friday includes media imagery of crowds rushing through stores, trampling the fallen, and fighting over savings on microwaves and televisions, as well as microwaves with televisions on them. Maybe you think that it’s silly to elbow a mother of three in the vagina to beat her to that rack of iphones, but that’s just because you don’t love your kids enough to do so. Sometimes, to get our loved ones presents, we have to be prepared to mow down strangers with our carts and quietly suffocate someone with a plastic shopping bag because they got the last Tickle Me Elmo with real hugging action and vibrating “belly button” for Mommy’s special alone time.

Why wouldn’t a person kill for savings? That Playstation 4 that you wanted the day it came out but were too lazy to work harder to afford finally comes down in price. If you don’t clothesline an elderly person to get to it, what was it all worth? Before you answer that, have you seen how sharp the graphics are? You can actually count the pimples of the hookers asses after you finish beating them senseless and stealing their money in Grand Theft Auto 5.

I say that we celebrate the primal violence of the day. As a civilization, we rarely hunt our own food or feel the need to run, and most of us wouldn’t know what to hunt or how to gather. People often live safe and comfortable existences without any fear, never having to put their lives on the line. Sure, that may be a good thing, but if machete-ing your way through a crowd to save 50 percent on a box set of Jason Statham movies is the only way to reconnect to our animal natures, then so be it. You’ll truly appreciate the feeling, even when a middle-aged woman is stepping on your unconscious face to get at that Tickle Me Elmo.

Speaking of chaos and violence, be sure to check out the musings of my Mother FBF’ers

* Author’s Note – This was a thinly veiled attempt to sell more copies of my book. Yes, I do love the writings of my fellow F’ers but come on, this post was like an episode of Seinfeld. Nothing happened. Seriously.

In keeping with the fact that it is October 31st, it seems fitting to talk about the true spirit of Halloween. Not the celebration of trying to scare the shit out of each other or soaping the car windows of that guy stiffed me on that repair I did in a thunderstorm. Halloween is about one thing and one thing only.

Candy.

Candy was my whole life when I was a kid. At least the first ten years of my life,until I found my first issue of Playboy crusting away behind the drain pipe to the sink in the bathroom. That began an entirely different life long obsession with hair teased to the moon and girls whose carpet didn’t match their drapes. I think the only clear thought I had those first formative years was: “GET CANDY!”

That was it. Family, friends, school, they were just obstacles in they way of the candy. Thats the reason you have to teach kids not to take candy from a stranger. Their brains simply can’t process any other thoughts. If I had been playing at the playground and a guy in a white panel van pulls up with “Free Candy” spray painted on the side I would have run after him like a PMSing teen girl runs after the ice cream truck.

Without a second thought, I would have looked back over my shoulder and yelled “This man has candy, I’m going with him. Goodbye. Whatever happens to me, just tell my family I died happy.”
My friends would have yelled “Don’t go! He already has the rope his is going to kidnap you with in his hand and that bulge in his pants likely isn’t a Bomb Pop.”
“It doesn’t matter, he has a ‘Snickers Peanut Butter’. I have to take that chance.”

So the first time you hear the concept of Halloween when you’re a kid your brain can’t even process the information. It’s like someone took Christmas and wrapped it in a cheap plastic costume.

I imagine I would have been simply amazed and asking “What did you say? What did you say about giving out candy? Who’s giving out candy? Everyone that we know is just giving out candy? Are you kidding me? When is this happening? Where? Why? Take me with you!
I gotta be a part of this. I’ll do anything that they want. I can wear that. I’ll wear anything I have to wear. Wear Dad’s week old stinking work clothes? Hell yes, I will.”

So, the first couple of years most parents made their kids costumes which of course sucked : the ghost, the hobo, the hockey player out of a jersey that was fifteen sizes too big and you tripped while running from house to house smashing your face into the gravel driveway but simply adding a new level of authenticity to the look.

After a while the home-made costume isn’t going to cut it so with hours of begging and pleading you finally convince your parents to buy you that super hero costume. Superman for me of course. That cheap plastic poncho style from the seventies before parents cared that the plastic cape was a bigger hazard than the razor blades the old guy at the end of the street was kind enough to hide in an apple. At least you could use the razor blade to cut yourself free of that three dollar sweat box. The best part of the entire costume had to be the plastic mask with the eye holes way to small to see oncoming traffic.

Remember the rubber band on the back of that mask? That was a quality item there, wasn’t it? That was good about 10 seconds before it snapped out of that cheap little staple they put it in there with. You go to your first house: “Trick or…” Snap!” So you stand there trying to tie a knot in the elastic while scoping out the candy bowl to see if its even worth the effort to stop.

Mean while your older sibling has already taken of to the next house with you screaming and crying for them to “Wait up!”

Even in the Superman costume already on a sugar buzz from the popcorn ball the old lady on the corner made with eleven pounds of white sugar, you were never fast enough to catch them and still get to the house they had already finished. Simply because you couldn’t move at all. When you did it was an arms out shuffle like the Jawas running across the sands of Tattooine. Let’s be honest, no one tried those costumes on before the night they wore them. No one checked the labels. I do remember that costume distinctly and it did come with a warning label –

“Do not attempt to fly!”

They printed that as a warning because kids would put it on and climb up on rooftops figuring that millimeter thick red plastic cape would at least make an excellent parachute. I love the idea of the kid who’s stupid enough to think he actually is Superman but smart enough to check that warning label before he goes off the roof.

“Let me see if it says anything about me being Superman..Oh, wait a second here, this does say exact replica of Superman’s…”

Not that it mattered anyway because your Mom always bought it in a size big enough to fit over your winter coat. I don’t really recall Superman ever wearing a jacket under his outfit but it certainly did make you look like you had the muscles to fill it out properly. So there you are with a plastic mask whose rubber band keeps breaking and snapping you in the face, so you tie it in a knot that keeps making the mask tighter to the point the plastic starts cutting into your eye while you try to breathe through a keyhole and all you keep swallowing is your own sweat.

All in pursuit of candy.

Finally you just give up and fire the mask in the next driveway you wander up so now its just you looking like a Superman sausage with your hair plastered to the side of your face. Ringing the door bell, the neighbours immediately know its you but you are past the point of caring. You have a pillow case that needs filling.

Despite the sweat and the blood running down your face from the staple in the plastic mask, it made it all worth it when you found that one house. Not one of the ones giving out handmade bags of those orange plastic bananas that no one ever ate and left to collect in the bottom of the candy bowl. No, the best house to find was the one giving out cans of soda. It didn’t matter that it was knock off brand soda. Or even if it was the most dreaded of all flavors, Root Beer. No, all that mattered was it gave you just enough energy to trudge the long walk home with a pillow case full of candy you knew your Dad was going to pick the best stuff out of.

So this year, do something nice for those kids you see in the plastic costumes. Buy brand name candy for God’s sake.

What would a blog hop be without something to give away. As I really don’t have any sponsors other than myself I can make the rules as to what I am offering and how you can win it. Up for grabs is one of my charcoal pieces of art found here as well as the added bonus of a sneak peek at the bonus story in my soon to be released into the wild first book.

In the comment section below, I want you to tell me about the dirtiest trick you ever pulled on someone be it Halloween or other. It seems to me that the dirtiest trick will get the sweetest treat.

After you are done telling me your sordid tale, spend some time getting to know my fellow Funny Bloggers. Not only are they giving away some seriously killer prizes but they are fantastic writers as well.

FUNNY BLOGGERS: WE WANT YOU!!! Are you a funny blogger? Do you know a funny blogger? Do you read someone who’s hilarious, sarcastic, inventive, crazy or inspired in their madness? Send them our way!! Or if you’ve self-declared, We want YOU! SEND OUT THE WORRRDDDD!!

A few of us bloggers (who have deemed each other funny) are going to participate in a Funny Blog Friday (#FBF) blog hop on Friday October 31. There’ll be prizes and of course a boat-load of funny blogs for your reading pleasure.

Why not make Friday even better than it normally is with a few funny insightful sarcastic bloggers poking fun at the world or themselves?

Additionally, we’ll be attempting to make every Friday funny on Twitter with the hashtags: #FBF and #FunnyBlogFriday

If you want to join and be added to the list please email me: victoria (at) angstanarchy (dot) com

There are a lot of days where I consider myself the Clown Prince of the Blogosphere but even I have to admit there are a ton of great writers around that I laugh my back hair off at. Starting Friday, October 31st, I will be joining forces with some of these fantastic people to form the Justice League of Humor.

The Funny Blog Friday blog hop features comedy and prizes from such recockulously hilarious writers as –

I could feel my left eye involuntarily twitch at the simple statement. A low throb had settled in at my temples from the idea I had just now contemplated and had confirmed. I sat dumbfounded looking over the crisp white sheets of paper in front on me. The instructions on them were as simple as I imagined they would be but the concepts were as foreign as North Korean stand up comedy.

“I know its going to rough for the first few weeks but if you are serious about the goals you have told me then I think this is the best course of action”

My head was swimming now in a haze of brown liquid. It jolted itself through the steps it had taken me to get to this moment as I tried to focus on the last few words written on the bottom of the first page.

From the race last year and my feelings of failure despite finishing quite respectably.

My fear over a diagnosis of being prediabetic.

A family history of massive heart issues.

An extended family full of men whose waist lines grew in almost exponential equations to the receding of their hair lines.

The numbers I saw every day when I looked at the scale that seemed to always hover around the same few digits no matter what I did or didn’t eat.

I knew I needed help but had no idea where to start.

I think in the last ten years I had tried every single workout program from P90X, a program I fully believe would keep anyone from being accosted in the showers in prison to wrapping my body in plastic wrap and running up and down the stairs at the boat launch. Every food craze from kale smoothies to raspberries ketones to squirrel intestines. Every health drink from protein shakes to frozen green tea, which has led to a jug in my fridge being constantly referred to as “Dad’s New Weirdo Health Thing”.

It shouldn’t be that hard. It shouldn’t require that sort of effort. It all seems so simple.

After meeting a personal trainer, who despite being an amazing specimen had only yet another book to offer me as far as nutrition went, I decided to take a different approach. I had seen the sign for the office on my way to a meeting and a quick phone call led me to the moment of unreality I was now facing. Michelle, the nutritionist, sat across the table from me with a smile that never wavered. After taking my height and inspecting me like a 4H girl inspects a blue ribbon calf she motioned for me to step on the scale.

I unloaded even the lint from my pockets on to the table holding my keys, wallet and phone before with that levitating step on to the biometric scale. My weight was three pounds heavier at 220 pounds and a body fat percentage of 16 percent. I sighed and looked over at the nodding smile.

“You are actually in great shape for a guy with your muscle mass.” Michelle said as she made a few notes.

“Not where I plan on ending up.” I answered her unspoken question.

After a few more questions about my long-term goals, the printer beside her desk spit out the plan I now held away from my body like a distant aunt holdings a puking baby.

“Seriously?” I balked “No coffee at all?”

“Not for the time being, no.” Michelle answered as she settled her long frame back in her chair waiting for I am sure was the explosion she had likely seen more times than I have seen that video of the three puppies yawning in unison. My mind couldn’t comprehend the idea.

The other diet ideas were as basic as I imagined they would be. No breads, no grains and no sugars. It was the no coffee that struck me like a back-handed pimp hand. I love coffee with a devotion bordering on the obsessive. To the point where my eyes can’t even open in the morning until after my second cup. This was one of those choices that you never want to have to make. Like which one of your kids you love more or if you were getting bacon or sausage with your mountain of pancakes at Denny’s.

“Okay.” I sighed with a hitch in my voice not unlike saying goodbye to an old friend ” I will do it.”

“Fantastic. We will see you back in three weeks.” Michelle said as she stood and guided me out the door.

My resolve was firm though as are all peoples with a new set of instructions. That first initial step on the path to good health taken. What no one tells you is that while the first step is simple the actual journey is like walking the Boston Marathon with the road covered with oddly angled LEGO pieces.

The first sip of green tea, the only caffeine I was now allowed, the first morning nearly broke my resolve. There were so many great coffee shops along the way to the job site. Each of them promising to wash away the medicinal tea taste and the film my sludgy breakfast smoothie left on my tongue. But I held my resolve. At least until the headache started. The first signs of caffeine withdrawal setting in and the beginning of a six day headache that made even the smallest of things seem like Titanic scale disasters. All the while, coffee shops on every street corner with overflowing urns like Mrs. Potts in “Beauty and the Beast” singing their aromatic song that promised to take away all the worries I had in the world. A magic potion that would fix all my ailments.

But as I stood in my kitchen on the morning of the sixth day watching the kettle boil, I felt my pants slip off my hips and down over my butt. Not really an uncommon thing but never really happening while I wore a belt. I snickered as I pulled my belt into a spot it hadn’t been in a very long time. I had been skipping the heavy weights I always had used in favour of long runs and outdoor hikes in an effort to lean down. Clearly something it was working. It just wasn’t easy. It would have simply been easier to roll up to a drive through get an extra large Double Double to go with the dozen honey dipped donuts that had been haunting my palate for weeks. I just couldn’t shake the image of being one of those guys that sweats walking from my car to the front door of a fast food chain.

I had heard a quote that had really struck me and it was never more true than every time I watched one of the guys that work for me slurping down a giant chocolate milk while I sipped a retched vegetable based cleansing drink that tasted like a combination of rancid asparagus tips and Old MacDonald’s sweaty socks.

“Live one year of your life like no one should so you can spend the rest of your life like no one could.”

This thought was firmly in my mind as I walked through the doors of Michelle’s office a few days later to check in. Her knowing smile was confirmation enough that I had likely been through the worst of it. We chatted briefly about the mood swings that had my family wanting me dead and the restrictive plant-based diet.

“Let’s see how you did.” Michelle said as she motioned to the scales. That momentary lightning bolt of panic ripped through my brain with the same doubts I always faced when approaching the scales. Had I done enough? How bad had I done? What would happen if I had actually gained weight?

I stripped off as much of my clothing as the nutritionist allowed after trying valiantly to “drop some pounds” in her office bathroom before stepping on to the judgemental machine. I closed my eyes and waiting for the sigh that told me I had yet again failed.

“It’s better than good. It’s great.” She replied as she jotted down the notes. I stepped down and pulled my shirt back on. I was dumbfounded. It had actually worked. I sat in almost silence as she went over the next phase and how I should expect my progress to slow down a bit. We talked about the pace I needed to set in order to get to my now much lower goal weight and how with proper diligence I could get there in the six month time frame I hoped for.

“You seem to be right on track,” Michelle said as we stood by the door to a completely new world ” What are you going to do next?”

“Well right now I am going to celebrate and cheat on my diet with a donut the size of a soccer ball and a gallon of coffee.” I said as I pushed the door open.

How do you tell a story about your life when your life has become a routine of work, eat, run, sleep?

When the Muse will not descend, you have to look for other ways to keeping putting the pencil to paper.

A few years ago, I lost everything in a house fire including all my sketch pads. When you lose something in that fashion it takes a while to get the urge back. It also set in motion the idea to use the charcoal that my own things had become to come up with new sketches.

Something simple.

Writing has been a chore the last few months as I prepped my book for release so I stuck to fiction writing that can be found on my other blog. Fiction requires inspiration and when that fails, I decided to break out the pencils and try my hand again at drawing.

Charcoal is a great medium for finding the truth in a single bold line.

From a complex pencil sketch with dozens of lines,

To as bold an image with a few simple lines.

But as simple as it seems to find a true image of a simple creature it requires a more deft hand to capture the most complex creature of all.

Bold lines for the boldest of creatures.

So bold that I even framed my favorite piece to hang on an accent wall in my living room.

Things always seem more easy to understand when you break them down to the basic components of black and white.

So when the urge to write escapes you then just put pen to paper. Or pencil as the case may be.

The average writer usually writes for around a year and a half before they realize that they have no more words to say. That the story they set out to tell has finally been told. They move on to different things almost always with the plan to someday start up writing again but few seldom ever do.

So to reach the two-year anniversary of my auspicious beginnings as a writer, for me, it’s a true remarkable thing.

After the failure of my first writing efforts and my inability to get published, I didn’t know if there was much point in continuing. Yet, here we are now, two years later and I am still striving forward. Not as much here for the time being but still writing none the less.

I have always believed that it is the journey that changes you and not the destination. The last two years of my life are proof of that. I have met some amazing people through my writing. Some changed me for the better, some broke my heart more than I thought was humanly possible and some even kept me sane in what had to be some of my darkest hours.

So, to all 1,257 of my followers I say “Thank you”. Even the ones who got suckered into following me by the piece that got Freshly Pressed only to find out I leave dildos in mail boxes and get caught taking a dump behind a garden shed and blaming a defence less dog.

Even though I don’t spend as much time here as I used to, my time is being put to good use and hopefully in the very near future you all will see the results.

In accordance with my policy of never reblogging anything ever, I am telling all of you to get your copy of this book so Wendi will continue to help me get my masterpiece out of my brain and into your greedy little hands.

So get your copy and say nice things about it so I can ride her coat tails into super stardom.

Over the last seven days, I have been either directly or indirectly involved with twenty-one baseball games. Mediated disputes over players. Eaten more white bread in the form of hamburger buns than I have in the past year. I have another week of games ahead followed by end of season meetings.

I have finished a job on a house that will forever be known as “Nightmare Mansion” based solely on the fact that the physical effort of finishing it nearly killed my whole team.

I have helped edit a piece of someone elses work when they were struggling to put its pieces together.

I have exercised less than I have in months and eaten worse.

So, I have been forced to make a decision.

Since the first day I started writing here, through the demise of my first blog, to getting featured on Freshly Pressed, I have held on to the goal of publishing a book in some format or another.

To that end, I will be taking a break from writing here until I have the book at least in the hands of my editor.

I have no desire to turn this place that I have laboured over for this long into a place where I simply whore out my book when finished. I will still be writing here but on a limited basis until the book comes out.

In the next few days, I will be unveiling the cover and the titles of the two super secret bonus stories I have written exclusively for the book.

Ever since Morgan Freeman made that far-fetched movie, everyone has been using the term “Bucket List”. It’s become some mystical and unattainable list of things that people keep adding newer and more expensive things to that they will likely never accomplish. I usually try to be open to new experiences and not limit it to a simple list. To be sure, I have things I want to accomplish but the list is short. Swim with Great White Sharks in Australia. Publish my first book. See Motley Crue in concert one more time.

That’s it.

As I said, anything else that I accomplish on the way to those dreams is just extra cheese on my pizza. Instead, I tend to focus on the things I have no intention of ever trying or trying again as it would be.

My Anti-Bucket List.

1. Cannibalism

In the heat of the moment I have eaten ass but I don’t think I would ever want to do it as my sole means of survival.

2. A vampire facelift

No one needs to relive the Twilight era with my white face leading the charge. I have been told that my ass is white enough glow in the dark but I don’t believe it.

3. Inseminate pigs

I grew up on a farm and as such am no stranger to what happens on Dollar Draft night at the Slop Bucket Saloon but I really can’t see me ever wanting to inject a porker with any type of fluid. Even for the sake of more bacon.

4. Get a full face tattoo

This does not include getting matching facial ink with Mike Tyson as that would be unbelievably bad ass. No one would ever mess up my Moccachino at Starbucks again in fear of me biting their ear off.

5: Eat a local delicacy. Anywhere.

I paid the price for an early morning Coney Dog on a five-hour drive home from Port Huron, Michigan. My apologies to the bathroom staff at the London “On The Run”. As well as the elderly gentleman who offered to get me a Popsicle to sit on for the way home. Apparently its quite soothing.

6. Have my foreskin back.

I have gotten along thus far quite well without it and the process of stretching the skin of my penis back to the shape it would need to be sounds like it should be a punishment for robbing old women of their pension cheques with the promise of sex.

7. Practice world champion level streaking in Barrow, Alaska.

If you were to ask any of my neighbours where the bald, naked guy lived they would quite assuredly point you to my place as my proclivity for wandering about in the buff are widely known. That being said the idea of dropping my pants in a place where exposed skin freezes in less than sixty seconds makes me feel bad for my nipples.

8. Organize and video tape an orgy at the local senior center.

Having seen “Human Centipede” and “Two Girls, One Cup”, I think I am rather immune to most images but the idea of that much naked and ancient flesh twerking up on each other like a bunch of pink balloons filled with Cottage Cheese would haunt my dreams for a long time.

9. Help a stranger wipe.

Even with my crippling hero complex there has to be a line that even the Man of Steel wouldn’t cross. I mean should a fifty dollar bill exchange hands I might be prompted to step in but only after a brief discussion of dietary habits and whether or not it was Taco Tuesday.

10. Nicholas Cage.

I am sure there will be more things I add to the list like getting dysentery in a foreign country that has nothing more than single ply toilet paper but for the most part I would rather be open to new experiences. I will just remind myself to stay away from nursing homes on Taco Tuesday.

Being based out of Canada, land of Degrassi Junior High and Poutine, I feel compelled to share my culture with those of you not fortunate enough to live here.

Every summer there is a festival of buskers in a nearby city. It may be just a Canadian thing but streets are blocked off for miles while street performers of all types ply their trade to the enthralled masses for a few sheckles.

Here for your entertainment, I present the contortionist and acrobat Al Kazam. Before this ending act he had squeezed his body through a squash racquet and contorted his torso around to get his mouth close enough to his own junk that he would never have to wait around till the end of the night at a Country bar on Ladies Night.

The video is brought to you courtesy of my newly minted Youtube channel in conjunction with my Tumblr account that can be found under the account @jackchaser76. Yes, I will admit I am building a platform from which to launch my book but a bonus feature of my Tumblr account is that is the only place to have pictures of yours truly.

That’s deeply philosophical for a guy that chemicals his pool naked but it’s intensely true.

In my effort to make a living and put the finishing touches on the long-standing dream of publishing a book based on the hilarity found here my writing time is at the barest of minimums.

But a great man once said “I have a dream”.

Mine is simply to sell one copy of my first book.

I stress the word “first”. It is my goal to publish many books but I believe this is a great start.

But there are still days where it feels like a grind. That every word typed is a weight pressing down.

So every morning I listen to this piece of motivation.

It’s important to remember that while you are pursuing your dream others are too. That they will have no problem letting life beat you to your knees and keep you there simply as a means of getting one step closer to the goal than you are.

Writing can truly be a grind.

Especially when you are writing about events that occur in your life.

I purposefully leave out the mundane or boring. I could whine and bitch with the best of them but if that’s what you are looking for I can point you in the direction of several writers who bounce out those kinds of posts daily.

I will still be grinding out my dream. One word at a time. Because there are hundreds of books published daily.

It’s just my dream to make mine the funniest one people have ever read.

So while time may be slipping away it is at least being put to good use.

I can’t even imagine what that must be like. Look at what it did to Elvis. “The King of Rock and Roll”. From a young heart-throb who took over the world with his hips to a bloated God who flew halfway across the country to get a peanut butter,bacon and grape jelly sandwich. It must be nice to have that kind of freedom but the responsibility would be awful.

But, maybe being the king of something a little off track wouldn’t be so bad. Well, a lot off track but who cares. Maybe something not in musical entertainment but in another form of entertainment.

So, how about the “King of Dildos”. Because seriously if I attain that who can trump it? Like Steve Jobs created the empire of the iphone, I’ll start a “dildo empire”.

I will be the creator of the greatest and most realistic dildo that has ever existed. You know one that senses real emotions and reacts, talks, walks, and more. The kind of sex toy that every woman on the planet would want. I think the best feature would be to make that dildo mobile. I don’t mean hide it in your luggage when you visit your sister for the weekend. No, I mean crawling like an inch worm and doing tasks around the house when you are at work. Capable of sensing your moods and crawling up to you when you need a synthetic fake penis to snuggle with.

Even more revolutionary would be a dildo that got along with your friends too. You’ve got your friends over “hanging out” and your dildo just happens to crawl up on to them. How fucking weird would that be? “Amber, is that a cock that just crawled by me?” Looking like the realest penis you ever saw. Just have cocks crawling all over the fucking place like an army of inch worm minions.

“Amber, your dildo has a boner and it won’t leave me alone.”

“Well Jill, he likes you. If you start bitching he will crawl away.”

Little dildos just crawling around the house really isn’t a big deal. I mean it’s 2014, I have seen some of the toys they make for kids these days. We have the technology. We can make this boner move. “Get a long lil’ boner”.

So what do we call our top of the line 2012 “All Star Dildo”? How about “Tickle Me Boner”? Sounds quaint. Now, this cock would be programmed to say things like, “Your butt looks good in those jeans” or “No baby, I wasn’t at the strip club with the other dildos, I swear”. All the lines guys always use to smooth everything over with their significant other.

I would advertise the shit out of my dildo. “This beautiful dildo will even stay up and bring you cheesecake after sex. It’s the one part of your man who you needed without the attachment of your man.”

I think the should be intelligent too. Like smarter than the smartest phone ever could conceive of being. They should just simply sense when they are needed.

Think of this, you’re just sitting there in your seat. You’re at the theatre, watching a movie that has your mate sobbing and in crawls this real as real it gets penis. Just inch worming his little head closer to you. You look over and think “Damn is that a penis? What the fuck? That is a penis. Honey look, there’s a penis crawling on the floor over there.” When all it really wants is to comfort a crying woman and let her nibble on the chocolates he brought her.

Every woman in the world would want one and before we knew it there would be flocks of cocks just trailing along behind girls every where they went. If they could somehow post stuff to Pinterest through a wireless network, it would put one in every purse in the world.

It really is only a matter of time. Forget the zombies rising up. It’s going to be the dildos that take over the world. The view from the Dildo Throne should be quite spectacular.

“Would you please just walk down there and see what it is that he needs done?” My mom asked as we stood in my office listening to the sounds of saws ripping wood, nails being driven and curse words sailing across the void.

I sighed and looked out the window at the structure being erected in the yard down the low sloping hill outside my office. The heat radiated outside the window in shimmering waves and I could already feel it on my recently sun burnt skin. I could feel the beginnings of my skin shedding around my shoulders and had to fight the urge to tear my clothes off and scrape my skin off with a toilet brush.

“Have you ever had neighbours that didn’t feel the need to renovate the house next door?” I asked as I passed a had over my stubbled cheeks. With the temperatures reaching an unseasonable high, all I wanted was to play Depth Charge with a six-pack in my pool. A game which basically involves me drinking beer while floating on a pool noodle and waiting to see which can sinks my battleship.

“It can’t be much,” Mom countered while ushering me out the door “It’s just a back yard shed.”

Grumbling about the male nurses at the nursing home she was fast tracking her self towards fondling her in her sleep, I wandered around the driveway, past the large trampoline and down the grade to the Frankenstein style structure being erected. A saw was chewing its way through a board with the ferociousness of a toothless prostitute gumming a cob of uncooked corn. I heard a muttered curse and saw Rocky, the square-jawed and equally flat-headed military neighbour step out from behind the wood frame.

“Looks great.” I said with a half sarcastic tone that matched my smile as I roamed the large rectangular building.

“It sure will be when its done.” Rocky said as he joined me in the single shady spot in the yard mingling his wood dust scent with my asphalt odor creating a scent that would drive long-term death row inmates into a sexual frenzy.

“If you don’t mind my asking,” I continued as I took a half shuffling step back towards heterosexuality ” It’s kind of big for a back yard shed, isn’t it?”

“Well, that the thing, it’s more of a workshop. My kids are always getting into my tools and I just wanted somewhere I could go to get away from them. Plus I can store the trampoline ” Rocky said with a bit of admiration at his own handy work.

“Sounds like a solid idea. You just need a roof on it I suppose.” I said already knowing the answer.

“I will get everything you need. I just need a couple of days to get it up.” Rocky said not catching my snort at the idea of it taking days to get it up. I mean they have pills for that I believe.

“Just let me know when things are firmed up.” I laughed and headed back up to my truck.

Over the next few days, I watched with laughable patience as the structure took shape. Large benches and the frames for what could only be built-in sofas took shape and I was subtly impressed at the detail that was going into a simple back yard workshop. I watched early one morning as the delivery truck backed into the driveway and delivered the last of the materials needed including everything for the roof.

My day ended early and I figured I would just simply suck up the couple of hours it would take to slap the roof on this weirdly appointed structure. The temperature had finally broke the night before with a thunderstorm of sphincter tightening proportions and left the air cool and free of humidity. I slung my tool belt over my shoulder and stole a Diet Coke out my Mom’s fridge before down the driveway.

I could hear muffled grunting and the squeaking of springs as I neared the back of the house. I assumed Rocky was moving the trampoline and figured I would offer a hand. I heard a louder groan that caused me to pause but I knew they could be a pain to move having slung my own kids trampoline around the backyard a couple of times a year to cut the grass under it after it reached the growing up through the trampoline stage.

There was work being done in the yard when I finally crossed over behind the house but it wasn’t much I was going to help with. I know there is something biological that drives animals to dizzying acts of sexual deviance but I certainly wasn’t prepared to see my Mom’s neighbours stripped to their waists having energetic and somewhat dangerous sex on a trampoline. Rocky’s exposed white ass cheeks could have guided in a lost boat at sea with their brightness and his equally pale wife looked like she was being shaken by a paint mixer.

The sight was almost hypnotic. I chuckled as the idea of clearly my throat loudly came and went at roughly the same time I think Rocky did. I sauntered back up the hill and figured my afternoon was ruined with the haunting visions of white dangling balls slapping black poly mesh until I saw Rocky walking around the side of the house. He waved me down and I hesitated before walking back down. I had no idea if I could keep what I had just seen to myself without giggling like a Japanese school girl.

“Everything’s ready for you.” Rocky said as he pulled the tail of his shirt out of his obviously hastily pulled up shorts before unconsciously adjusting the front of his shorts and grimacing slightly.

“I know I watched the truck drop off the material,” I said “So I walked down a few minutes ago.”

Rocky eyed my questioningly as I realized what I had said. I figured I should just get it over with at that point.

“I maybe should have waited for a few more minutes.” I stammered until I saw Rocky break out in a shit eating grin.

“Maybe,” he said “But then you could have watched me wedge my balls between the edge and a spring trying to get off that fucking trampoline. Do you have any idea how uncomfortable something like that is?”

“Oddly enough I do,” I answered quickly “I froze my sack to a fence post last winter while I was running.”

My lungs were burning as I rounded a slight uphill grade out of a dense growth of pines and laid my eyes on what had elicited the shuddering sound. The trail stretched upward at such a steep incline that my heart sank to my sweaty crotchal zone. I slowed to what felt like a crawl and when the traffic in front of me bulged up like an unexpected erection when you are wearing track pants I did the only thing I could.

I grabbed the twenty something year old Asian girl who had come to a dead stop and tossed her over the fallen tree in the path and jumped over it myself. My calves screamed as I pushed as hard as I could down on my feet and tried to push my duck foot walk into a stumbling jog up the ski hill.

From the time I crossed the hay-field that had been converted into a parking lot until stepping up to the starting line at the base of the ski hill hosting the event, I was astounded by the rock concert atmosphere of the Spartan Sprint. Athletic bodies as far as the eye could see mingled with children running as wild as mongrel dogs. I had been training for this moment for months. Along with my own personal Yoda, my best friend Rob, we had set our sights on the finish line and resounding glory of finishing a Spartan race. Months of training and planning and running had led to the moment where we would bolt through the starting gate and hammer our way through the course. We would cross the finish line hand in hand like a non homosexual but still surprisingly fashionable couple.

We wandered around with the rest of our teams and families in awe of the spectacle. Thousands of people all clamouring for the chance to hurl themselves at the mountainous course. I was ready and pacing like a donkey trying not to step on his elongated scrotum. We had watched the previous heat leave the starting gate and of the hundreds that left not one had managed to maintain even a jogging pace at the top of the first treacherously long hill. I was determined to make it out to the front of the pack and maintain my pace. I had been killing my times running miles and had been jogging up the ski hill not four minutes from my house over the past few weeks. My training regimen alone should have given me an advantage.

“You ready?” Rob asked as we approached the massing bodies at the starting gate.

“Fuck yeah.” I answered boldly as I pulled my headband up from around my neck and put my number in place.

“Only way to do it,brother.” I answered as he pulled his Batman shirt off. We stood like gladiators waiting to be fed to the lions or at least the raging herd of cats I was sure the super fit Amazon near the front of the pack had in her apartment but had been neglecting to feed for the past month. The event announcer dressed in full Spartan regalia counted down the time as we tensed at the gate. His Andy Frost radio voice was infinitely distracting but as he reached zero, we took off like a used condom.

The angle of the first incline rose quickly and it was nearly impossible to maintain a running pace. We slowed to a jog which rapidly devolved into a wide legged rapid walk. The same one most people get when they fart and aren’t really sure if anything came out so you hobble to the bathroom. My calves were sore by the time we reached the top which I thought was odd but made my way to the first obstacle. The wall traverse was one on the more difficult things to get over and I was glad it was out-of-the-way early in the race.

Side by side, my sun browned skin and his musician’s pasty white, Rob and I descended the first hill and I knew I wasn’t feeling right. I crushed my way through the next obstacle, climbing a spider web style rope triangle before pulling a hundred pound propane tank on a rope twenty-five feet into the air and turned to see yet another steeply rising hill. The sun was beating down on us and we shouted encouraging grunts at each other before heading back up.

Around the top of the hill and through more fiendishly designed objectives we raced before chasing each other down a steeply banked hill. At the bottom rested a set of gymnastics style rings that had to be crossed before advancing. The penalty for not making it through was the same as every other failure. A series of thirty burpees which for the uninformed are a combination of push ups and trying not to vomit.

Rob traversed quickly with his monkey like strength and much slighter build. I saw him standing at the end waiting for me when my hand slipped off and it dropped to the sodden ground below. I saw his chin dip a bit. I wanted him to run the best race he could not hindered by waiting for me.

“Go.” I yelled out to him.

“You sure?” Rob asked back as he turned his body towards the next set of hellish events.

“I will catch up.” I said determinedly as I dropped to the ground and forced my self through the penalty. I saw him scamper through the set of adult monkey bars and start the long trek up as I made my way towards the childs play structure. My hands carried my stiffening legs across the span only to have my hands slip just as I reached the bell that needed to be run in order to advance. My fingers grazed it just enough to make as much sound as an orgasm in church.

I bolted out of the area as more runners filled in behind me. I saw Rob as short way up the incline and jogged to catch up. I was less than a few hundred yards behind him when a feeling came over me I hadn’t expected.

I was just over half way through the race and I was completely out of gas. I had committed the cardinal sin of racing. If there is no fuel in the tank, the engine shuts off. I had listened to a few people who had run the Sprint before and said to eat a huge meal the night before but had paid very little attention to my own body. Caught up in the hype and fever of it all, I hadn’t eaten a thing that day.

I slowly forced myself to keep moving. The climb seemed to take an eternity. All around me, people from all different heats and levels of fitness were sitting off to the sides of the track in the cooling shade. I paused long enough to dunk my head under a cooling jet of water normally reserved for snow making before grinding out another long section of the course. I knew that no matter how long it took me I was going to finish the course.

Uphill and down. Over and under wooden walls. I ground out each section of the course with the grim determination of not finishing as fast as I had planned but finishing none the less. My dehydrated brain carried my body past the point I wanted to just sit down. I forced myself to crawl through dark,sticky mud covered by barbed wire until the crowds began to gather. I knew I had to be close. I saw dozens of people waiting at the last obstacle, an uphill rope climb slick from the muddy boots of hundreds of feet. I saw Rob with his medal for finishing already around his neck yelling encouraging things that to my fried egg brain sounded like someone farting into a pillow and blaming their dog. It spurred me on to claw my way up then slide down a rope before making the final dash over a roaring fire that traditionally you would make some grand leaping mid-air pose for the cameras. I leapt over it on numb calves and barely avoided burning the hair off my bikini line.

A medal was placed around my neck by a smiling blond in Spartan wear. She congratulated me and my rational mind came up with a line about mixing my chocolate with her peanut butter but what came out was a half-hearted joke about rubbing a Reese’s on my junk. I wandered away looking for some water before she could respond.

“We did it.” Rob yelled as I made my way out of the finish area “I was only a little bit ahead of you at the end.”

“That last hill took forever to get up.” I groaned and tried wiping some of the accumulated mud from my bald head.

“But you made it,” Rob laughed “Let’s hit the showers.”

The showers if they were to be called that was a crude system of hoses shooting water colder than a mother-in-laws kiss over the grime crusted masses. We made our way over to the line and were trying to sneak in before we saw that more than a few people had mud in orifices not normally designed to hold it. One young woman was hosing out her shorts and giving herself what must have been an arctic enema based on the flow of water gushing out the ass cheek holders on her yoga shorts. Another late fifties male runner with a chest of hair thicker than the sweater my aunt knit me for one Christmas that some how ended up as the bedding for a litter of piglets at a petting zoo had his shorts pulled out with one hand and the hose in the other was washing the underside of his dangling testicles with the care normally reserved for washing a newborns hair.

Enema Girl handed the hose off to Rob and he quickly washed down his arms before trying to rinse out his hair. I took the hose from him and tried to generate enough water pressure to get the thick coating off to no avail.

“Turn around.” I said to Rob. I started rinsing his back off and laughed when I looked around and saw at least three more couples of men doing the same. I had figured he and I would cross the finish line together hand in hand and yet at the end of the day we simply ended up in the shower together.

The rain was hitting the wind roof so furiously, it sounded like a swarm of drunken hummingbirds. The rain the weather man had been promising for over a week but hadn’t delivered left the area with the worst case of humidity blue balls. Over the course of a single morning it had finally broke loose. It was raining in waves that soaked sun burnt skin but had done little to dissipate the humidity.

Having hastily waterproofed the house we were working on, we cleaned up our tools and packed everything away as the rain-soaked us to our skins. As I packed away the tools in our tool trailer, my brother Dart and Mindy hooked up the garbage trailer to take back to our yard. Rain had plastered Mindy’s blonde locks to her face and she yanked it back into a semblance of a pony tail through her ball cap.

“You want me to take the trailer back?” Dart asked as he shook out his jacket and pulled it over his sodden shirt. The first rumbles of thunder ominously echoed the buzzing of my phone and I answered the phone before I answered the hanging question. My shirt was as soaked as a bar stool on male stripper night and I pulled it over my head before answering.

“It’s just one stop.” My mom said with that tone that meant she was not really giving me an option. Dart threw his hands up in the air in the “It’s raining, what the hell are we doing?” gesture and I watched as rain bounced out of his palms. I waved him off derisively as I got the address from my Mom. I turned to ask who was going with me and saw the truck with the majority of my team already rattling down the road like a vibrator dropped on a hardwood floor.

I looked back over at my truck and saw Mindy pull her sweater over her dripping tank top and retying the drawstring on the basketball pants she wore over her shorts. I realized I was standing in the rain shirtless and while it may have looked good in The Notebook it wasnt going to work on a service call.

What?

Don’t act like you havent seen it.

I rooted through the back seat of my truck for something to cover my nipples with. The only thing I could find was a white wife beater tank top that my brother was fond of. The only issue was I think he may wear a youth extra-large with room for a bag of Skittles between the material and his skin where as I am better suited to a curve hugging men’s large. With a sigh, I pulled it over my head and glanced over to see Mindy snicker at the sight.

“You look like you should be on Jersey Shore.” Mindy giggled.

“Aren’t those guys fairly attractive?” I asked knowing full well that the men on that show were about as attractive as oral sex from a homeless guy.

Mindy continued to stifle her laughs as the rain-soaked through the white cotton making the red of my sun burnt skin show through pink. I avoided eye contact with her completely as I backed out of the driveway and headed towards the address waiting for us. The rain continued to pelt the truck and I turned the heat up to compensate for the rapidly dropping temperature.

The house seemed modest enough if you avoided the concrete slab step that was falling into a hole beside the entry way filled with stagnant water swimming with mosquito larvae. With a sigh I nodded to Mindy that she should stay in the truck until I figured out what was happening. I slogged across the driveway and reached over the Ninth Circle of Hell to rap solidly on the front door.

In no time it was answered by a woman on the borderline between old stripper hot and the club footed crossing guard with the overly muscled right arm. Her lank hair had been pulled into a loose braid that matched the loose-fitting shirt she had scavenged from a case of beer in the early Nineties. The shock of cold water had caused my skin to goose bump and my nipples to stiffen to the point I thought they would tear through the horrible fitting cotton. Her eyes darted over my damp skin and my brain played the refrain from a bad Ginger Lynn porn movie. As a consummate professional, all I could do was ask to be shown where the problem was.

“It’s right over here in the kitchen.” Beer Shirt said as she pointed through a Nascar memorabilia filled living room. I walked past what had to have been a life-size stand up of Jeff Gordon to see a man standing in the kitchen with a flashlight pointed at the water dripping leisurely down onto brand new kitchen cupboards. Their newness was a stark relief to the rest out the outdated decor so I could see why she had called.

“I know you’re here to help,” the man said from underneath the combination of a matching set of unkempt eyebrows and ponderously huge mustache “But there’s really no need.”

“For shit’s sake, you are the one that screwed up the roof in the first place.” Beer Shirt said as she stomped over to stare at the water dripping the same way everyone in an elevator stares at the numbers. I saw the ceiling beginning to bubble and figured I should venture outside to see if anything could be done to at least slow it down. Mindy already was pulling the ladder off the truck and was walking towards the house as the home owners followed me out.

“It’s likely just on the flashing.” Bushy Brows grumbled as he slogged out after me ” I will fix it first thing in the morning.”

“At least let him look at it.” Beer Shirt scolded him as her eyes roved over my translucent shirt.

“I don’t need any….” Brows trailed off as he looked over to see Mindy pull off her ball cap and shake out her blond locks. As she stood the ladder up, the accumulated rain washed down the front of her and she laughed a girlish giggle. She walked back towards the truck and held the door open with her butt as she peeled off her wind paints to reveal a pair of cut off jeans that barely covered her cheeks.

Bushy Brows stood transfixed. His breath seemed to steam out of him. I felt like Hulk Hogan and Macho Man Randy Savage at SummerSlam when Miss Elizabeth dropped her skirt allowing the MegaPowers to get the win over Ted DiBiase and Andre the Giant. I used Bushy Brows mesmerizing drool to go up on the roof and see that not only was the flashing kitchen vent leaking but the entire roof was a disaster. I headed back down the ladder but not before catching Mindy bending over the back of the truck to get a tape measure and Brows adjusting the crotch of his jeans.

After discussing what had to be done with Beer Shirt, I went back to the truck to see a fully dressed Mindy texting away on her phone and avoiding my pointed gaze. I had left the people my cell number to call me if they decided they wanted the job done.

“You did that on purpose.” I said flatly after a few moments of silence.

“It stopped that guy cold didn’t it?” Mindy asked just as blandly but with a slight smile that slid up to her eyes.

We werent a half a mile down the road when my phone rang.

“Sex sells.” Mindy said as she shook her reapplied blond pony tail at me.

Technology has come so far in the last couple decades that its hard to imagine life without instant gratification. There are at least four hundred channels alone on satellite television with almost never anything on worth watching.

One thing never fails to amaze me though. One thing never disappoints. The haven of mindless television almost specifically designed for anyone that works outside for a living.

The Weather Channel

When the Weather channel hit TV, I though “Who in the name of Ziggy Stardust was going to watch a channel about the weather and only the weather reported by people who actually took themselves seriously?”

Next to watching the perpetual fireplace channel, I can’t think of a more boring concept for a TV program.

“Oh no” they say….”people want to watch the weather”. In fact they want to watch it so much, we’re going to repeat the same stuff every 20 minutes.

Know what scares me most about the Weather channel? I can’t stop watching it. I live and die by that twenty-minute interval of weather every morning when I wake up like a gambling addict clutching a ticket on a two hundred to one long shot that I have wagered my daughter’s virginity against.

The great thing about the weather channel is not having to following a story.Cloudy with sunny periods. Sixty percent chance of showers. That’s easy. You can’t get lost in the plot, or confused about who did it, in this story. No need to record the whole season and watch it back but still be confused by the ending in a fashion similar to LOST.

And there’s that catchy tune that starts every time the ‘Local Forecast’ is coming. I dive in front of the TV like a two-year old hearing Thomas the Tank Engine when I hear that playing. They talk about the rest of the country and the world for 20 minutes.

Then that Local Forecast tune hits and you think….. “Hey, we’re on!”

“Oh my God. That temperature reading was fifteen kilometres from my house. That guy they just interviewed in the freezing rain tried to have sex with my high school girlfriend.”

The fact that the weather network has succeeded, really opens the door too. Previously over looked potential channels are now being considered. Like…

The Benjamin Moore channel. We can finally tune in to watch paint drying.

The Awkward Silence Channel. Conversations that just drop into long stretches of uncomfortable silence as the people on-screen wont make direct eye contact with you.

The Angry Stare Channel. Twenty four hours a day of your mother-in-law glaring at you and slipping in comments about your weight every fifteen minutes or roughly every time you look towards the fridge.

But at least these channels have topics that change a little. The Weather channel stories are so limited.

There’s rain, sun, cloudy, snow and some storms; then you’ve seen it all. After that you’re guaranteed to be watching reruns all day unless there is a freak tornado that rips through your town and the only person they can get on camera is your cousin wearing yellow rubber boots, flowered shorts, no shirt and holding an umbrella.

So I imagine them, in the board room, trying to come up with other stuff to fill in the time and make the weather entertaining….

“So how do we make the weather entertaining?”

“I know, I know.Let’s not just talk about our weather because we’ll talk about that every 20 minutes but while they’re waiting to hear the local forecast… again… we could entertain them with… weather…somewhere else!”

“Yeah…….Other peoples weather! Brilliant Idea, Jim!’

So we’re kept glued to the screen between Local Forecasts watching other people’s weather because we certainly couldn’t just go outside and look for ourselves. No. We sit glued to the screen like testicles to a dried out condom.

As fun as that is, while we’re thinking outside the box here, why not talk about yesterdays weather.

We could do a spot like “… and now for a look at Yesterdays weather in our “How Wrong We Were About The Forecast Recap”

“Hey, yesterday was a bomb wasn’t it? I know we said it wouldn’t rain Saturday but… well, it’s a crap shoot really, and we got caught this time.”

“Still! We nailed it Friday, didn’t we?”

Literally, the only profession where you can be wrong ninety percent of the time and still not only keep your job but do it again just as poorly the next day with a plastic smile plastered on your face from all the Botox you’ve had to hide the fact you worked your way through college as a gay male escort.

I have coached baseball for a lot of years at this point and yet it still never fails to amaze me at what can happen.

I have seen countless foul balls hit parked cars and seated testicles.

I have seen face plants and ass cheeks studded with gravel from a poorly executed slide into third base.

I have seen an entire team giving each other a Gatorade shower during the second to last inning of a game and then rolling in the red clay sand creating the world’s biggest “sugar cookies”.

I have seen parents losing their minds over a single dropped ball and rejoicing when a child gets hit by a pitch to load the bases.

I didn’t think much could surprise me.

Yet, I was completely unprepared to have a six-year-old girl who wore a skirt instead of her uniform stepping up to the plate, taking a practice swing then promptly dropping the bat and bolting as fast as she could across the field towards the Portapotty yelling –

“Play without me, I gotta poop!!!”

Proving yet again, that when you think you have seen it all, a kid shits their pants.

Peace, Love, and Hardly Any Understanding: The Buzzkill of Fighting Siblings

Not What We Were Expecting

So, you and your wife want a boy and a girl. It’s the perfect distribution, right? Maybe so, but your dream child combo could turn out to be a nightmare. I don’t have many examples to go by, or any kind of scientific data for that matter. I just have what I have: a boy and a girl who take sibling rivalry to a maddening, curse-inducing level.

KidsHealth has this to say about it: “While many kids are lucky enough to become the best of friends with their siblings, it’s common for brothers and sisters to fight. (It’s also common for them to swing back and forth between adoring and detesting each other!)” This is true of my kids except they spend most of their time on the ‘detesting’ side of the spectrum.

Into the Unknown

Dealing with two competing children is much like an intense poker game in that one never really knows the danger in all of the cards on the table. You don’t know what those little demons are thinking, and you don’t know what act will set off an explosive incident. Betfair describes this dilemma eloquently in a tips and strategy article: “Poker is full of strange situations where something that appears a great thing to do is actually totally wrong, and something that can appear terrible can actually be right.” I learned this the hard way. As a matter of fact, I keep learning different variations of the premise on a daily basis.

A Failure in Pink

For example: My work week is coming to an end and I am in a great mood because I had minimal interactions with incredibly stupid people who are mysteriously above me on the company ladder. On the way home, I stop at the store to reward myself with some cool trinket or gadget. While heading towards my department of interest, I spot a baseball glove on the clearance shelf. It would make a great gift for my 10-year-old son, so I grab it realizing that now I also have to pick up another gift for my 5-year-old daughter. After all, I want balance in the universe, and bringing home a surprise for each child is the fair thing to do. I find the first reasonably priced pink item and head home with my iSomething, a baseball glove for my son, and something pink for my daughter.

As the aforementioned Betfair article described, this scenario seems great, when in reality, it could go horribly wrong. What I didn’t take into account is that my daughter is so competitive that this is one of those few times that pink turns to gray and is completely unappealing. She just wants what her older brother has—in this case, a damn baseball glove. A warm and thoughtful gesture on my part has transformed into a peace-disrupting, ring of fire.

Whatever Gets You Through the Day

The University of Michigan Health System offers this advice for sibling rivalry: “Make sure each child has enough time and space of their own. Kids need chances to do their own thing, play with their own friends without their sibling, and to have their space and property protected.” You can take this approach even further and enact extreme measures. Implement a ‘No Sharing’ rule in the household. Many experts encourage sharing, but in my house, sharing only leads to fighting. Encouraging it would be foolish and masochistic.

For some reason, my kids are more likely to claw each other’s eyeballs out at bedtime. That’s probably when they are most tired and violence is the only way their little bodies can handle the growing feeling of exhaustion. So, each night at around 9 p.m., the ‘No Talking’ rule commences. I separate my kids like two entangled boxers after the bell and order silence. It’s not the best style of parenting, but in our home, it’s effective. Forget what the experts say, I just want some peace and quiet.

Enter at Your Own Risk

This article is not intended to dissuade people from their future offspring plans. It is simply a friendly heads up to the innocents that may have a slightly distorted image of reality. And for those who still insist on having the idyllic opposite gender pair… Be careful what you wish for!

I have this theory about Female Superiority because I have noticed they don’t seem to need us men.

We’re physically stronger than they are but it feels like we need them more than they need us.

Fact is, statistics say most woman prefer chocolate over sex. A survey in Men’s Health of a thousand women found that seventy-eight percent of women, given the choice, would rather have a piece of milk chocolate melting on their tongues than a single drop of a guys cream filling.

Chocolate. Wrap your head around that tasty bit of truth.

When you think of it, us guys were in trouble right from the beginning.

This is what I think really happened:

God creates Man.

An interesting creature, loves to take things apart, blow stuff up and scratch his junk like a class room full of ninth graders with raging gonnorhea.

Now, it’s not that God didn’t do a great job on us, but for some reason, a day or so later He see’s a problem.

And then He’s saying stuff like “It’s not good for man to be alone, all this guys done for the last five hours is masturbate and giggle at the monkeys flinging poop at each other and laughing at their weirdly shaped asses”.

Like we need a babysitter or something. So I think man, right from day one, was a bit of a cluster fuck.

And He didn’t want us alone down here, taking stuff apart and eventually flinging our own poop at the monkeys because what really was stopping us.

So He gets busy creating…Woman.

Now woman will have to be superior because she has to be totally self-sufficient and able to look after this man gone sideways.

I think at some point God had a little heart to heart with Woman.

You know, explaining the situation.

“Eve, sweetie, You are privileged among woman”

*rolling eyes* “Uh huh”

“I know I know, he’s a handful.”

“Ya think!?”

“Hey, Hey…just remember, where the real power lies, “Up Here”.

“I made you stronger “up here”

“Look, I’d considerate it a personal favour if you just kept this between us.

But I’ll make some adjustments, and he’ll be following you around like a puppy dog.”

So life goes on with Women ruling the world without us even knowing it and us trailing around after them with our tongues hanging out, our brains turned off and our erections poking them in their ass cheeks if they slow down long enough to pick up some loose change on the ground because no matter how they think of themselves if they have a low-cut top and flash a little cleavage we will help them move furniture or let them borrow our cars to go on a weekend get away with their boyfriends.

They have this extra sense called ‘Intuition’

A creepy thing. It allows them to know stuff without any information. Especially when we have totally fucked something up or slept with their aunt.

And look who they hang around with. Sure we spend a lot of time with them but that’s just them ‘on the job’ looking after us.

Look at a woman who works in a daycare. Here she is communicating at baby intelligence level all day long.

After work, what does she do for some adult stimulation? She gets a piece of chocolate and goes looking for a woman to talk to because she needs some mature conversation, and face it, woman are more mature.

And they mature sooner than men do. Girls are ready for life in their late teens, early twenties.

While guys are still riding bikes off cliffs or trying to skateboard down handrails at 30. I think that’s how the entire Competitive Eating circuit started. Two thirty something guys in a bar fighting over who could suck down the most pickled eggs while a crowd of beered up locals cheered them on waiting to see who threw up or had a heart attack first.

I mean, as a gender you are mature enough not to spend your time masturbating or flinging poop at each other.

Most of you any way.

As guys we understand you are superior to use in almost every way. Thank God he gave us a penis. Until they find a way to replace that I think we are in pretty good shape.

The single line of text stared me in the eye every time I looked back over the file.

“Don’t rule me out just because I am a woman.”

It was a simple phrase that left me rubbing the back of my stubbled scalp and shaking my head.

Construction is as tough a job as any you will find. Add in the height element of roofing and even some of the toughest guys I know mysteriously find their testicles in the icy grip of paranoid fear. I had come back to this particular resume at least a dozen times as I sat pondering the applicants I had gotten them from. A polite and simple cover letter came with this particular one and I had skimmed through the listed experience before I even looked at the name. I was subtly impressed by the credentials and then saw the name.

I had already been through a handful of young men who had done less than stellar work in their brief auditions. One even went so far as to tell me the reason he was quitting on his very first day was the simple fact he couldn’t locate my office even using the GPS in his car.

I looked at the cover letter and its message was simple. Don’t rule me out. It struck me as particularly well-timed and funny at the same time. Why had I never considered hiring a woman before?

To be honest, not many actually ever apply for a job in construction. The ones that do are usually petrified of heights and want to hang around on the ground or are looking for an office job. Neither of those are an option. So I sat staring at a candidate for a job that had all the requirements I had asked for. Except one seemingly unspoken one.

The lack of a penis.

Put down the sexist chant sheets and your over full glasses of wine, ladies.

I have seen the heat and sheer heavy lifting nature of the construction industry break many a muscle-bound meat head so I was naturally concerned. My brother, Dart, had taken her resume when she offered it and he passed it along to me with a wry smile.

“I have no idea what to make of this one.” Dart said as he showed me “She’s literally half your size.”

The idea of a hundred and ten pound girl throwing around bundles of shingles made me snicker a bit as they would represent almost eighty percent of her body weight but then I kept going back to the single simple phrase.

Don’t rule me out.

I didn’t hesitate for a half a heart beat. I sent her an email asking when she could start.

My phone buzzed not long after with her response and a request to pick her up at the end of my street on her first morning as she wasn’t sure where my office was. She was already a step ahead of the last Dildo Factory reject.

I was a bit nervous as I headed out to the truck the following Monday morning. Dozens of thoughts were rolling through my head in regards to my job site handling of a girl employee.

How would my team of foul-mouthed miscreants treat her?

How could I make vagina jokes without offending her?

What if she didn’t like getting dirty? What if she had PMS? What if she had to poop?

I saw a blonde pony tail sticking out of a baseball cap framing a face wrapped around a mug of tea bigger than a mini keg of beer. She waved and I slowed the truck down. I swallowed hard and thought if I had any reservations this was my last chance to turn back. She was shorter and skinnier than my daughter and there was no way she was going to survive her first day.

“Jack?” she asked as she flung the door of my truck open and hopped into my coffee cup strewn front seat.

“Mindy?” I asked in reply as I extended my hand. Mindy smiled and gripped my tanned hand in her slim white fingers. She flipped her sunglasses down and they were large enough that they looked like a child playing dress up. She turned to look out the window and pulled her phone out. She was texting away at a rate my thumbs ached watching.

We got to my office and she hopped out before I even had the truck in park to introduce herself to everyone. My guys were mildly dumb founded but they welcomed her the same way they did all new employees by making her clean out my mess of coffee cups and protein bar wrappers from the floor of my truck.

The job site wasnt far from my office but the thoughts continued to percolate. First and foremost being how long it would be before she sued my company for some form of sexual harassment followed by what I was going to do when it got hot enough out for all my guys to start going shirtless and how I was going to explain to my insurance provider that I had advised her against it but she wouldn’t listen resulting in her having nipples so sun burnt that she could no longer breast feed the child she was planning on having in the near future.

“Are you ready?” I asked her as soon as we pulled up to the house we had started the previous day.

“Are you?” Mindy asked with an almost imperceptible laugh.

“Ready as I will ever be.” I replied with a sigh.

Mindy hopped out of the truck and saw where my guys were setting up. She grabbed a shovel and made her way up the ladder. Her safety boots seemed miles too big for her and clunked with every step.

“Where did you want me to start?” Mindy called down to me as I grabbed my own gear. She had made her way to the ridge of the house and thunked the shovel down like it was made of solid concrete.

“Right there is fine.” I said and turned toward the ladder only to see something I hadn’t quite expected.

Mindy attacked.

She started ripping shingles off like a badger with raging case of pink eye. What she lacked in size, she definitely made up in tenacity. I laughed as I watched her before the realization hit me that while she was small and testicularly challenged she was really just like the rest of us. All she needed was a chance to prove it.

Now all I had to figure out was what to do the first time she asked me to add tampons to the first aid kit.

There are few thing sin your life that you simply can’t shake once you have seen them.

Like the first time you see your Mom naked. Or your Dad. Or the first time you see them naked together.

For the elderly lady that lives across the street from me and rides her Wicked Witch of the West bicycle at all hours of the day giving me nightmares, I assume she is never going to be able to shake the image of my fridge light revealed naked form double fist dunking strawberry frosted Pop Tarts in a giant glass of chocolate milk because this diet I am on has my body sleep eating at three in the morning damn near anything that I can mash up into a baseball sized mound and shove into my face like something out of the Walking Dead complete with the awkward shuffling and groaning.

Be disturbed by that image all you like. I will not be able to shake the image of her peeking in my windows.

With my new-found commitment to exercising pretty much daily, I spend a lot of time running outside.

It really is a thousand times better than the severe boredom of running on the treadmill even if the new fashion trend at the gym is yoga pants so tight that a vagina looks like a McDonald’s cheeseburger on its side.

So when the weather is bad and the monotony of the cheeseburger watching starts to get to me, I take up the old past time. Swimming.

Remember as a kid how you could swim for what felt like hours, get out, suck down a sand coated piece of watermelon and keep going? Turns out that sort of energy fades as an adult.

So the answer to that is organized swimming lanes clearly marked like traffic lanes on the highway and God forbid you are swimming in the wrong lane.

There’s the Fast Lane. This is for your serious swimmers. Competitive. Ruthless. They know how to do those somersault flip turns and wear Speedos that highlight how hairy their inner thighs are.

The ‘Medium speed swimming’ Lane. This lane is mostly full of ‘Fast lane’ rejects because everyone thinks they’re fast. They usually are for about the first lap and a half then tire out.

But these disqualified fakers got embarrassed out of the Fast lane by the really fast swimmers continually passing them.

The fast swimmers love this. They don’t actually say it but you know their thinking it…

“Lapped you again, fatty”

Now if a Medium swimmer doesn’t get the message and change lanes , they’re in for that special visit from the Lifeguard – the ultimate pool embarrassment.

Having been identified as too slow for the lane the authorities have now arrived because of the noisy environment the Lifeguard has to shout and everyone can hear….

“Sir, this is for advanced swimmers only! Please join the other Orcas in the Slow Lane”

“What?” they say, pretending not to hear.

“The Fast lane! You need to move over with these swimmers!”, the Lifeguard bellows, pointing at the slower swimmers of the Medium speed lane. Michael Phelps’ clones continue to rush by, doing those flip turns.

Humiliated the demoted swimmer slips under the lane rope, back to their own people,…..the medium… the mediocre…..the un-Speedoed.

Finally, there is the slow lane.

Usually renamed with something like “Leisure Lane” because it wouldn’t be nice to call someone slow.

These swimmers don’t put their heads in the water. They paddle their merry way along, usually in the standing position, some have that neon pool noodle wrapped around them or a floatation belt that lets them appear to be doing it on their own but much like a push up bra you know those things aren’t floating up that high on their own.

Every ounce of energy used to keep that head above water and after 5 minutes and no forward movement, they’ll reach over and start pulling themselves along with that lane rope. Back on sturdy ground, they go back to what they know….the Therapy pool.

Easily the most popular destination in any gym, it’s a haven of warmer than normal water designed to ease strained muscles and relax the mind and yet it constantly is full of elderly women with their asses pressed directly over the jets of the heated water pretending we have no idea they are doing it and diapered children trying valiantly to hold in the poop they told their parents they had to take a half an hour ago before their Soccer Mom parked her ass down beside the other iphone wielding debutants all looking to “Lol” at the text they just got from the boyfriend their husbands don’t know about.

Peeing in the Therapy pool is popular as well. Statistics say 70% of swimmers admit to peeing in the pool.

With these kinds of numbers supporting peeing in the pool, why continue ignoring the issue, instead we should embrace it.

Now a days, with all these water park features… Surf riders, slides, lazy rivers and wave pools, maybe we could invent toilet pools.

Toilet Pools, a new exciting experience for swimmers, while they relieve themselves. With that new pee sensing agent changing the color of the pool, It would have a realistic ‘Toilet Blue’ color.

Every few minutes the Lifeguard could reach up and pull this giant chain, starting the whole pool swirling round like a whirlpool to simulate the adventure of being flushed down a toilet. Forcing the young and old a like to swim as fast as they can against the on rushing swirls and suction out a tube in the bottom of the pool, through a drying tunnel and depositing them into the gym.

I know you have been busy lately what with the running a business, training for the Spartan Race in June, organizing the local softball organization, getting your booth organized for the home show, hiring new employees including the first girl who will have ever worked for you and trying to keep your junk covered up but I will be honest…… I miss you.

Remember all the good times we had?

The long winter days and late summer nights regaling people with our tales of puking, pooping and penising?

Those were some of the best times of my life.

I know its only been a few days but I feel like we are drifting apart.

You have to understand, I literally can’t live without you.

I am not asking for much. Maybe even a few words a day? A new picture or two a few times a week?

All I ask is you not resort to using me to post ridiculous memes or pictures you stole from the Chive just for a couple chuckles. That cheapens us both and just shows what kind of attention whore you can be.

I will be waiting here for you whenever you have a moment to spare. Even if it means I have to share you with your fiction blog.

Love always,

The Things I See Up Here

Dear Blog,

Let’s be honest. We’ve been having issues for a long time.

We have been together for just over a year and the good times have been truly great but you can really be a drain on what little spare time I actually have.

Yes, I am exceptionally busy and spend the entire weekend at the home show for business pressing flesh with an arena full of senior citizens that had the odor of a diaper full of moth balls but that is the unfortunate price you pay for being self-employed.

I know I havent spent much time with you lately and my workaholic habits bother you but lets look at some of your more annoying tendencies.

You think Jaws 2 was better than Jaws.

You pronounce it “cousint” not cousin.

You use air quotes when talking about the moon landing.

You know all the words to “Rio” by Duran Duran.

Must you tell everyone you meet about the Dildo Factory?

Your favorite actor is Kirk Cameron.

You rode the plastic car in the kids section of the funeral home at my grandmothers funeral and no it’s not okay because the car was black.

Two words – Leather Pants.

Yet for all your glaring faults, I still spend at least a few minutes with you every day.

Even if it’s just to see what your friends are up to.

Even when I am dead tired from a ten-hour work day because they are calling for four straight days of rain followed by a six kilometer run on a swampy island then sifting through resumes to find new employees and coming to the conclusion that the best one is a ninety pound girl with a neck tattoo.

So even though my time with you is limited please know that it’s usually the only time of the day I can truly be myself.

Occam’s Razor is a theory that states that taking everything into consideration the simplest answer is almost always the correct one.

I could hear the rhythmic thumping of my dog’s foot pounding the floor in the bathroom as I rounded the corner into my bathroom. His vacant childlike expression of question was the first thing I noticed. He had been digging at his ear and I could see flecks of blood down the side of his snow-white fur.

“Winter, come here baby.” I playfully called him to me but he resumed his digging and I sat down on the mat beside him. I turned the faucet on in the tub and dampened a soft cloth before wiping down his neck and ears. He hard parked himself in front of the toilet and I noticed flecks on the side of the bowl as well. His stubby boxer nose with its single black spot nuzzled my hip looking for the hug he usually gets after I have done anything he deemed unnecessary.

“Hang on.” I laughed as he whimpered a bit to get my attention. I grabbed some toilet paper and dried out his ear which led to a vigorous head shaking. I laughed as he looked like Dumbo preparing to lift off for his first flight. I lifted the lid of the toilet and was puzzled to see the bowl already full of blood.

The simplest answer is always the correct one.

“Fred?” I called out to my daughter “Where you cleaning the dog up or something?”

There was no response so I walked across the hallway to her bedroom. The flecks of blood on the top of her green and purple duvet had my brain reeling as I didn’t remember the dog being in her room at all. I pulled the cover off her bed and saw matching stains with larger smears across her bottom sheet. I pulled all her bedding off with a grumble under my breath about keeping the door shut so the dogs couldn’t get on her bed. Especially when Winter had been digging at his ears.

The simplest answer is always the correct one.

I started gathering up dirty laundry as it was strewn down the hallway. I figured if I was going down stairs, I might better take every thing I could. There was a ball of Fred’s clothes tucked under some towels and I pulled them apart and my heart stopped cold in my chest.

No way.

The simplest answer is always the correct one.

I stumbled down the stairs in that numb state parents find themselves when a child fails a grade or dings up the car the first time they take it out. The door was closed to the downstairs bathroom. I dumped the laundry across the hall and took a deep breath. This was a moment I had hoped her mother would deal with when it happened but here it was quite literally in my hands.

I knocked softly on the door. That quiet knock you give when you are terrified of what was waiting behind the door.

“Fred, it’s okay.” I started really not knowing what else to say “I mean it was going to happen. I just hoped it would be five or seventeen years from now.”

“It’s fine , Dad. We learned all about it at school in health class.” Fred responded through the door that seemed to be a barrier between us that had simply sprung up by her growing up. I rubbed my head and felt the stubble. I was due for a shave so I put my hand against the door briefly before taking it away like there was a fire behind it and not my no longer so little girl.

The simplest answer is always the correct one.

There are moments every man has to face at least once in his life. Moments where his courage and resolve are tested. Moments he will be a better parent for.

Standing in line at the pharmacy with an arm load full of every size and shape of pad produced in the known world for his twelve-year-old daughter and a can of shaving cream is one of them.

I nearly swallowed my tongue when the girl at the check out smiled and asked if “That would be all?”

“Just double bag that please.” I implied with the same wary eye that guys use when buying a porno magazine at a new store. Not that I have ever had that experience either.

The walk up the driveway felt like the longest fourteen steps in history. My brain kept wandering thinking about where I had missed all the day of her life that got us here. I thought about her sitting in the driveway drawing little stick princesses in side-walk chalk and me drawing giant Great White sharks eating them. I thought about the first time she rode her bike to school and I counted the seconds until I saw her turn the corner towards home.

None of those moments were gone but they would be replaced with the anxiety of boys (which are still thankfully gross) and friends and all the things that come with having a teenage daughter.

I noticed her door to her bedroom was shut . I inched down the hallway and hung the bag on her door. It felt like it was heavy enough to pull the handle off. I stepped away from it like it was a bag of poisonous snake.

“I left some things on your door for you,” I said softly “Just let me know if they are the right……things….”

I walked silently across the hallway to the bathroom and closed the door. My breathing was starting to slow itself. I dropped my pants and sat on the toilet. I didn’t know it I was going to puke or poop first and I figured I would rather clean up puke off the floor before poop. I heard the snap and creak of Fred’s door followed by the rustling of the doubled up plastic bag. I could hear the shuffle of her feet across the floor.

The bathroom door flung open and Fred promptly strode the short distance to the sink and deposited the shaving gel I had bought on the counter. Winter followed right behind her and sat at her heel digging at his ears again.

“You know I am pooping right?” I asked as I covered myself as best I could.

“I know.” Fred said as she planted a kiss on my cheek “But now today is awkward for you too.”

Their snide looks. Their subtle superiority complexes. Their quickness when clawing your arms from fingertips to facial stubble for simply touching them. Every single thing about them.

I have always been a dog person. That may say a lot about who I am but I think it boils down to the simple give and take relationship that you can expect from a dog.

That has always extended to the dogs of people I have done work for. I have had them climb up in my truck. Steal my lunch off the back of my truck. Pee on my tools. It happens. It’s just kind of what you expect from a dog.

I heard the dog before I could see it. The wild maniacal barking all dogs do when someone knocks on the door. The same kind of nervous excitement guys get when they are waiting for a girl to answer her cell phone the first time you call them right up to the excited peeing. Its claws scrabbled at the lower panels of the door so I figured it wasn’t a large dog. As the door swung open the barking became a low throated growl that inched closer to my boots. They were wet from the morning rain that had rolled in and I wiped them off as I stepped inside the door.

I laughed as I saw the dog. It was dachshund that couldn’t have weighed any more than five pounds but every hair on its body was standing straight on end like the back hair on an old man at the beach when he takes his shirt off. I had to tell the customer that the job was just too intricate and time-consuming to risk it in bad weather so I would be back the next day. The sausage-shaped dog continued to bark and snarl until its owner picked it up.

“He’s never bitten anyone.” The owner said derisively as the dogs insanity calmed down to a level just below needing electro shock therapy. It bared its teeth at me again as I explained the plan for finishing the job around the sun/ snow/ rain mix that was expected in the next few days. As I headed toward the door to help my team pack up our gear, I heard the crab claw clicking of toe nails on the floor as the wiener dog shot across the floor and grabbed the hem of my thick carpenter pants. I looked down to see the wild-eyed glare and the flash of needle teeth before the dog latched on to my calf. It felt like being stung by thirty bees all at once in a piece of skin the size of a dime.

I kicked the dog away from me and reached down to pull up the fabric. I saw six puncture marks and a welt that was already turning a purplish red.

“I thought you said he didn’t bite” I said gruffly as I rubbed the spots of blood off my leg.

“He never has,” The owner said as he scooped up the now blood fuelled engine of hate “Well…..I mean…..he bit my wife’s aunt twice on the leg last week and bit my wife’s hand so hard yesterday that we called the paramedics but he’s really just being protective.”

“Protective of what? Your vast collection of professional wrestling video cassettes?” I growled.

“You’re not going to sue are you?” the owner asked as the dog continued to thrash like a vibrator dropped on a tile floor.

“No.” I said flatly “Are his shots up to date?”

“As far as I know.” The owner said with a sigh that told me it wasn’t the first time the subject had been broached.

“Then I will be fine.” I said as I headed out the door into the drizzly dampness. The throb in my leg didn’t ease at all as I got into my truck and headed to meet a possible customer at their house.

I once again heard dogs as I got out of the truck but this was the low monotonous bark of hounds and I wasnt disappointed as I saw two massive dogs heads up over the five foot retaining fence. Their droopy faces dangling like an octogenarian’s labia and just as wrinkly. I laughed as I saw them and then threw up in my mouth a little at the imagery.

“Don’t worry, they don’t bite.” I heard the home owner say as he walked out of the back yard. It was like he could read my mind as I kept my distance from the braying labia faced animals.

“I wasn’t worried.” I answered with a tremble in my voice echoed in a painful throb where the teeth had gouged into me.

“Come on around back and I will show you what I need done.” The labia dogs owner said as he motioned for me to join him in the backyard.

I opened the gate and felt my first step into the back yard sink up to the ankle of my boot. I looked down and saw I had landed squarely in a pile of dog crap the size, shape and oddly enough the same color as the dog that had bitten me. I couldn’t contain the laugh as the owners face fell when he saw my boot.

He had no idea that while I had no love for cats that my day had gotten a whole lot better by crushing a pile of shit shaped like a wiener dog left there by a dog with a face like a pussy.